I took the most damage (my thumb still hasn't healed), but he ended up in the guillotine. >)

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Ahhhhhh Dennis!<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-comfficeffice" /><o></o> <o></o>So when are the two of you gong drinking again? Shit Ill buy it is sure to not be much more than a good Pay Per View and the seats will be way better.<o></o> <o></o>Glad to see you made home safe with the bruises coming from the Alcohol

Thank you a hundred times over AntiHero for your quite "heroic" efforts here. In a word, your report is "wonderful." (wander-ful) You are a maverick, an intellectual cowboy on an exotic, foreign, metallic horse (thoroughbred). Sorry, but there is nothing "anti-hero" about you. You are just one of so few straight-out freaking post-modern heroes! (Deal with that.) On top of that you have serious writing talents. So often your words hit resounding emotional chords.
I kinda cringe a little bit at all the shots people take at those souls that choose to stay at home, raise families, or whatever their reasons may be for not rambling--that's their business regarding what they do or don't do or where they go or don't go. Do what you will with your life--after all, you're in charge. (at least for us who are fortunate enough to have been beneficiaries of those that have sacrificed everything for our freedom) Those of us that have the wanderlust, we roll on (and on, and on....) But that bug doesn't infect everyone. Hell, Immanuel Kant never left his hometown. (Although, in all fairness, if he had an Italian fire-breathing refined beast at his disposal it might have been a different story.) Thing is--some of us are sessile and some of us are tumbleweeds. Roll on dude! -dayll

There are plenty of great independent shops around the country that will do Ducati maintenance for about 1/2 the price of dealers. Their work is as good or better than most dealers, although YMMV. That said, the Panigali 15,000-mile service is about double what the dealer wants to do my MTS 1200.

3 hookers for $1900? Not the two I talked too. They started at $1500.....of course, on a scale of 1-10, they were about 10.5! One of 'me was a 12!!!!!

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Jeez I got to start partying w/ U guys, I got short arms & deep pockets. And FWIW, I can go to DR for a week, party like a rock star, w/ at least 2 different chicken heads daily, and that $1900 includes air, hotel, food, drinks, Wepa

Ducshop in Atlanta does my non-warranty work. There are other excellent, independent Ducati shops around the country. I do hydraulic systems flush and oil changes myself, leaving the infrequent valve adjustments to the pros.

Having hit 15,000 miles in Death Valley (or maybe even a little before), I brought my bike into Ducati Newport Beach to have my first 'major' service done. I hope you're sitting down. When I called to ask how much it was I was not. Though Ducati has done a great job of doubling the time between valve adjustments (15K for the 1199 vs. 7500 miles for the 1098/1198/848), the frameless design requires complete disassemby of the bike. Swingarm, forks, everything. 16 hours, $1898.24.

Makes the look of these in the showroom a little less appealing:

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Ducati has this backwards, they should be paying you. This RR has given them and their new bike a fortune in free publicity.

Just finished your RR. Great story and adventure. Don't see how some have read it overnight. Anyway, just got back into biking after being off while the kids grew and will plan some extended rides this coming season. Picked up a "78 beemer R80/7 in 8/12 and it should certainly be up to the task after my winter checkout/maint./re do. Will think of this story many miles from home. Keep rollin'

When I finally got back to my old residence in LA I anticipated some shock. Being out on the road, traveling from place to place meant there were no yesterdays. The state of my life for the past six months has been one of constant anticipation--a series of present and near-future moments endlessly rushing at me. I couldn't get my head around all that coming to an end. So I hatched a backup plan: DENIAL! In this instance that translated into not stopping. I planned on heading down to San Diego for a few days while I tried to get my head around what I was going to do next. Prior to that I collided with my former life.

I said at the beginning of the trip that when I left it was a suicide of sorts. That I knew I'd come back different. But I didn't really think about what would happen when my new self returned to the life of the old self. If the trip marked the death of previous me, my return meant I was a ghost returning to the past.

When I finally arrived 'home' I was confronted with four years of accumulated yesterdays. And each of those 'yesterdays' contained no small amount of memories. And each of those memories had mental events attached to them. I knew it'd be a bit of a tangled mess!

Take, for instance, the stairs. While living there, I never thought much about them except, "wow, these would hurt to fall down." But after not seeing them for so long memories of everything from trying to squeeze a king bed down them to sprinting up them, .45 in hand, after the front doors burst open in the middle of the night came flooding back.

The "Orange Surveillance Van" that I had named our wireless network after, just to fuck with our conspiracy-theory neighbors (the punchline was it was their van).

A lamp and a "Faust" painting that should always be inseparable:

Same goes for these:

And then there were a host of far more personal things, like the "Evil Cat" Quadtych I had drawn for my ex that brought far more than memories back:

Don't get me wrong, I wasn't pining away or sobbing on the bathroom floor (especially after seeing the Evil Cat fondling chickens and playing with matches). I wasn't struggling to find meaning in anything, nor was I wrapped around the 'what ifs' of the past. It was more profound than that and it took me until just now, staring at this paragraph, revising over and over, to isolate what I was experiencing: it was a reaction to the realization that actions and efforts may not ever be accumulative; there is a sequence and then the sequence stops. (Hmmm....maybe the only thing that does accumulate are experiences.) It wasn't regret that I was going through--it was the experience of hope lost.

The trees in the backyard that had been nearly destroyed by the Santa Ana winds (the same ones responsible for blasting the front doors open in the middle of the night) while we watched transformers explode from the balcony were now full and lush. Proof enough that life goes on and damage is rarely permanent.

Take the personal, irreplaceable stuff, toss it in storage along with a few mementos of your current journey, cut all the anchors free and keep on goin. Plan only the big parts of the next journey and let the rest unfold as you go. Keep the fire stoked under your creative stew and simmer till .... there really is no end to this.

Book is done. Just going through some final edits. :) But before anyone jumps to any conclusions, it's more of a coffee-table book with 60 pages of photos and some quotes from the R/R (and a couple that aren't). I've begun working on a novel, but it's going to take no short amount of time to finish it.

The book (the eye-candy one) will be available for the iPad or in hardback. The problem with the hardback is that printing costs are high. If I was to go to a printer and request X number of copies I'm sure there'd be a significant break in price, but then I'd have to be the one to distribute (hard to do without a mailing address). Plus I don't even know if I'd sell more than 2. I'll consider some other options, but it's taken no small amount of time (and three different mock-ups using three different book making tools) to finally get a finished 'product'.

If anyone would be interested in an e-book of this ride report (with deleted scenes, more commentary, etc.), please PM me so I can have some idea if it's a good or a bad idea.

Next chapter: Southern Californa!

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Just been having a catch-up (been out the AH loop for a few). Still going strong I see.

Keep me up-to-date on the progression of the book(s), mate. I'd be really pleased to help you promote and distribute it, in whatever format, via the Kriega Krewe network and my mates in the Industry. Come to think of it, I'm absolutely sure, I could get excerpts published in the UK and US bike media, if you wanted.

I'll PM you my contact details again, in case you want to take me up on this. And - if you feel you have the need - the offer of some gear is still on the table. Just let me know where it shipped.

I believe the 15K service cost just shook me loose from purchasing one of these. My trusty R1200GS doesn't cost me that much even with over 50K miles of travel........:fyyff

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It doesn't matter what you do this on as long as it is what you want to be on. I get a lot of shit for riding a F 650 GS twin and amit that the name of it pisses me off for some reason, but I don't care because the bike is ME. That is in no small part of just one of the things so compelling about the Anti Hero RR. He rode his ride and overcame , simplified and put the bike where he wanted it to go. Someone once said in a post on another forum far away , just look where you want to go and take your bike with you. Now that is a speed racers idiom but it applies on other levels and describes for me what this guy proves in spades.

That said, the ride report may have make a lull in Stada sales for the Pennigale, but the maintenance report made the case for the MS in my view. Both interesting bikes but I've been jonesin 'for a Strada ever since i demo'd one in Atlanta. With the intervals the same as the penigale but the effort (hours) required to accomplish said maintenance the strada squeaks past the pennigale for those plebean enough as I am to need assurances about outlay. This is from a guy who put 40+K on an R 1200 RT in less than 18 months and spent in the neighborhood of 12K for tires maintenance and parkles at one dealership in the Atlanta area. That was a wake up for me. Adventure be damned I gotta eat and 12 grand put a kink in my plow chain so that was when I popped for the F bike and pretty much do my own maintenance now and before long will even have my own tire changer . I like to ride not spend money so you gotta learn shit and do your own . That is pheasable on a little twin like the F bikes and or older air heads but the Beemers keep getting more and more sophisticated and that means techs need to be called on for maintenance mroe and more.

OK I'm getting too wordy so I'll stop and read some more of this delicious RR and look forward to putting more out of town miles on the little Beemer going forward.

Stixx, After 2.5 yrs of lusting, debating, cogitating, you get the pic, I finally bought the bike.....a '12 MultiStrada! I sold a hell'eva nice bike to buy her, but she's a magical m/c!!!!! Did I mention the bike is magical? It's the closest m/c to an angel and to a devil...kind'a of a combination of both (thanks for that line 'Eagles')!

A buddy of mine built his own tire changer and I use it for my changes (the exception is TRACK tires!!!). It does sane $$$!